


Post Tenebras Spero Lucem

by figbash



Series: Nagron [4]
Category: Spartacus Series (TV), Spartacus: Vengeance
Genre: Backstory, M/M, Nagron, Protective Older Brothers, Romance, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-21
Updated: 2014-06-21
Packaged: 2018-02-05 07:11:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1809787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/figbash/pseuds/figbash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"After darkness, I hope for light." Agron's POV.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Post Tenebras Spero Lucem

The lands to which Agron and Duro were born lay east of the Rhine, north of the Danube, under great punishing grey skies. Their simple home had been dug from the earth, insulated from the bitter cold of winter with heaps of dung upon the roof. There were many days the brothers spent huddled on the hearth, naked but for the animal skins and soot and filth which lay upon their bodies. When kinder weather came, they ran wild among the beasts that grazed the valley where their tribe had settled for generations. The land was speckled with tiny, rough dwellings spaced apart at random intervals, but in close enough proximity.

Agron loved to imitate the warriors of the tribe. He would run to Duro with his battle yell, branch in hand for his sword. The first attempts brought tears from his younger brother, a sound beating from their mother, but it was not long before Duro could join Agron in his games. Together they squealed at each other, tiny arms echoing the sparring of the largest and most fearsome men of their tribe. Soon the proud tradition began to live on within them as their skills manifested.

Across the Rhine had come the Romans. The river had provided protection and clear boundary, but in mere days that safety was no longer. For miles the fires raged and human bodies burned to blackness. The stench seared itself into Agron's nose until he could barely draw breath for the horror of it. 

Duro clutched at him. “Where is Mother?”

“We must hide ourselves.”

_“Where is Mother??”_ Duro asked him again, hysteria rising sharply in his voice. _“Where is-”_

“Gone, Duro! She is gone. _Mother and Father are gone._ ” Agron tried to keep the tremble from his own voice. He pulled Duro's arm hard, forcing him to move as Duro began to cry. They hid themselves among the bodies that had fallen slain.

Duro was sobbing wretchedly now, and Agron clamped a hand over his mouth desperately, willing him to stop. The corpses trickled slow rivulets of blood down over them, soaking into their hair. Agron slicked it across their faces, and it might have been what saved them, as Roman boots crushed muddy earth around them. They lay still but for Duro's soft sniffling, which soon quieted until they were like the dead, limbs stiff and numb. Another full day and night had passed before they dared to emerge from the maggot-ridden mound of human rot. 

The smell of death had permeated their very skin, but there was no time to rid themselves of it. Agron tugged cloaks from two bodies, fabric caked with blood but providing much needed protection. He thrust one at his brother.

“Put it on.”

“No! I am sick with the stench of it!”

Agron grabbed him, yanking the cloak closed around his neck by force. “You are no longer fucking child, and I have no longer fucking patience. Do as I say if you want to fucking live.”

Duro was shamed to silence, picking miserably at the dried gore. Agron had begun walking away, and Duro hastened to catch up with him.

“...You will not leave me... Agron...?”

Agron stopped in his tracks, shoulders shaking. He looked up at the sun, then around to his brother. Duro was shocked to see tears making wet tracks through the dried blood painting Agron's cheeks.

“You are my heart, Duro. I would die to see you live but another day.” Agron's arm covered his eyes and his body was wracked with sorrow for all they had lost in such brief time, for the great burden that now lay upon his shoulders. He had not yet passed his 15th year of life.

If the season had been winter, it was undeniable that the two boys would have starved. As it was, the land provided them enough subsistence for a short while. They had set their aim upon the distant forests, where perhaps some of their people had fled, or perhaps even a forest-dwelling tribe might take pity, and accept them into their flock. Agron forged ahead with this vague idea prodding him on, taking but little of the food they scavenged, seeing Duro fed. Even so, as the forest loomed a few days' journey away, the madness of hunger had crept upon them. They ate anything within reach; worms, grass, even the earth itself.

“I go no further,” Duro told Agron, lying down on his side, his breathing shallow.

“We are nearly at the end!” Agron implored him, refusing to let go of his arm. “Perhaps a day, it is within sights!”

“I will die before the sun rises,” Duro said with a quiet certainty that terrified his brother.

Agron shook his head. “You will not leave me. I will not allow it.” With great effort, Agron lifted him, slinging Duro over his back. The limpness of Duro's body terrified Agron even more, and he set himself to his mission. “I will see us there before tomorrow's nightfall.”

They had been found a half-day's journey from the edge of the forest, two boys collapsed upon each other with hollow cheeks and ribs. The slavers had reached for them and even then Agron shielded Duro's smaller form, bony arms outstretched in feeble attempt.

 

Slaves from East of the Rhine were often sought after for the ludus. The Romans regarded them as a barbaric and warlike people. The highest entertainment could be derived if only a strong hand could discipline them. Duro and Agron had passed through novicii training that saw lesser recruits fall to their deaths; boys their own age chewed up and sliced through, like meat under the butcher's knife. The brothers clung fiercely to each other as though made of one skin, finding joy again in the strange life they had fallen into, where mere practice of killing brought them their daily bread. They grew tall and well-formed over the passing years. Their bond had eventually proven troublesome, and they had been sent to market with intent to sever it. But like a gift from the gods, the man called Batiatus had purchased them both.

It is the House of Batiatus that brands the brothers with the mark they will bear for the rest of their lives. Again there was the sickening smell of burning flesh as the deed was done, and briefly Agron and Duro thought to the mother and father lost to them in Roman flames, like a memory from another life. They set themselves to training even harder than before, their opponents far outstripping those of their previous ludus.

“Fuck! Two weeks and the mark is still raw as a whore's cunt,” complained Duro, flesh stinging from the blow Agron had laid upon his arm.

“I bear the same, brother... Without pissing about it.” Agron stuck his tongue out, eyes alight. He kicked Duro's sword over to him so they could begin again.

“That's because you have the hide of a goat. And almost as much sense.” They met each other's swords with enthusiasm, more closely matched than in childhood. Agron beamed with pride as Duro improved his technique subtly, not leaving his arm open to a second assault.

The pairing of Duro with Crixus set Agron on edge. Though yet injured, Crixus was a dangerous man as well as a Gaul, and Agron's fears loomed heavy as he kept watchful eye. Most dangerous of all was the gap of discipline that had always existed between older and younger brother. Where Agron was proud and occasionally rash, Duro was prouder and rasher still. Agron began to resist the urge to aid Duro when this natural inclination got the better of him, which was far too often for Agron's liking.

They had their first taste of the arena before long, and it was glorious. Never before had they worn fine armor, or heard the roaring bloodlust of the crowd. Agron was carried aloft by it, and fought skillfully with great sweeping movements that Duro envied. Agron's spear found the chest of the opponent that was moments away from claiming his brother. Duro threw off his helmet and cursed himself, grateful yet ashamed.

The thrill of victory lasted but briefly. Unrest was gathering like storm clouds over the House of Batiatus. Word had come, too, that Agron and Duro were to be separated for their next match. The news shook Agron more than he allowed Duro to see. Agron knew that his brother would fall without his protection. When Spartacus whispered his plan of freedom, as hopeless and impossible as it was, Agron and Duro were the first to join.

Again Agron's fears loomed heavy over him. They were to commit acts of great violence, borne of desperation. For Duro to be free again, he would do it. 

“Stay to my side. Do not stray from it, and I will see you beyond these walls,” Agron said to him, an ache of love in his chest so great that there were no words for it.

“I do not need you to hold hand,” scoffed Duro.

“I only wish your life protected, you fucking cock!” Agron bit out with exasperation, as though they were boys again.

 

It is one kind of pain to have a loved one fall from sight. When the wound had still been fresh, Agron had imagined many times how his mother and father had met their fates. Were they separated or were they struck down with their hands entwined? Did they fail to heed caution as they searched for their boys, lost in the chaos? To have them disappear without standing witness to the violence of their deaths was a curious blessing from the gods. There was no such mercy granted Agron on the day of blood that freed him from the House of Batiatus.

Despite Agron's protection, despite his words of caution, and despite the love Agron held for him -greater than any earthly thing- a Roman sword found Duro's chest. Without second thought, Agron's sword sliced cleanly through skin, muscle, and bone, severing the head of the man who had done it. Duro fell into his arms. 

“I save you this time, brother...” spoke Duro with his last strength, like a knife through Agron's heart.

Agron tasted the acid of his bile. For a few moments Duro clutched him, darkest blood streaming to the ground beneath them, and then Agron's deepest fear was made true. The gods had turned from him, and stolen Duro from his side. Agron bent to kiss his forehead, and then he screamed until his throat was raw.

 

What followed was darkness for Agron, hanging upon his shoulders, weighing upon his soul. He ate but did not taste, he slept but did not dream. His anger rose quickly, and was slow to fade. He pushed onward with Spartacus and the rebels because there was no other purpose for him after losing all. Agron found the hollowness filled with thirst for Roman blood, insatiable.

Their numbers grew as they traversed the land, in search of Naevia. The villas they ransacked were vulgar in their display of Roman excess. Hateful reminders. Impossibly, Agron is moved when a body slave makes attempt on Spartacus' life. The boy is fierce but lacks skill to commit the deed, and for some reason Agron thinks of Duro, of all things. Still bucking and wild, even with men twice his size holding him fast, the boy was granted mercy by Spartacus. Agron watched him closely after that, intrigued.

The first words Agron says to him are lightly mocking. “You press fortune. Glaring so at the slayer of Theokoles.”

“His victory but proven even giants fall,” the boy returned. Agron wondered if he was not yet done with his designs on Spartacus.

“What name do you go by little man? So that I may properly mourn your passing,” asked Agron, a glimmer of humor in his eyes.

“I am called Tiberius.”

“Tiberius? You are far too dark to have such a fair Roman name.”

“I am more Roman than Syrian,” claimed the boy. Agron nodded, though not quite believing his words. 

“There was a Syrian in our ludus. A treacherous fuck if ever there breathed.” The boy cast Agron a brief look of annoyance, but Agron was impervious to it. “You have family there?”

“I only recall a brother,” the boy responded, impassive eyes upon the crowd. 

Agron felt something distant within him unlock. “I too had a brother,” he told him, a sudden impulse.

The boy looked to him. “No longer?”

Agron shook his head as the pain flashed through him, still too new and raw. “He was struck down by the Romans.”

The boy narrowed his eyes. “When you turned swords against them?”

Agron felt the rage bubble up inside him, threatening to overtake. He pushed it back with smile that held a hint of madness. “As you shall one day, if you hold any fucking sense.” 

 

The boy did himself proud in his aid to their cause that night. Agron heard the boy's true name for the first time. “Nasir,” he had said, locking eyes with Agron. “My brother called me Nasir.” 

Agron found himself yet more intrigued. The next day was quiet, with endless talk over maps and strategy, numbers of able men, numbers of supplies. His eyes catch glimpses of Nasir throughout the morning, his head turns in distraction when Nasir walks past. At midday Agron found him sitting with a brooding look and couldn't help but wonder his thoughts.

Nasir looked up at him before Agron could break words. “Your gaze lingers.”

“You are averse to attentions of mere gaze?” Agron smiled at him, but Nasir did not return it. Agron shifted subject. “I am to be watchful, lest pup bare fangs again,” he teased.

Nasir bristled visibly. “I am no pup.”

“You are no pup, you are no Syrian, yet your body tells a different tale.”

“It has told many,” Nasir said, his dark eyes holding Agron in level regard. “Not all of them truth.”

Agron swallowed, feeling a flush of heat over his skin. After a day of confusion, the clutter of his thoughts ordered themselves in an instant of clarity. Desire. A quickening of the heart, a stirring of long-slumbering cock. The sudden need to grab and touch and kiss the exotic creature before him.

Nasir watched him, and Nasir knew. Agron looked away but found words again. “I would hear your tales.”

Nasir considered him a long moment. “...I would first ask it of you. Then perhaps see it returned.” The barest smile crossed Nasir's face, gone in a heartbeat, like a door shutting against morning light.

And so their conversations began. They slipped into easy familiarity with each other, and Agron took the hours of Nasir's days unabashedly. During the nights, the restless thoughts of desire hit him like a fever. He would pace the villa as he roamed the corridors of his thoughts, under ethereal light of moon.

How curious it was that even when Nasir betrayed him, spilling their secret of Naevia and the mines, that Agron still smiled at him. He wished badly to persuade them from such foolish rescue. Against hope, Agron still wished to see him again.

“Fucking Syrian.”

Agron could not help but contemplate their fate as he moved with his group towards Vesuvius. The mines were a den of horrors, with corpses pulled from their depths almost as often as precious stone and metal. Agron thought of dark endless tunnels, chained slaves on their knees in mud and grime, Roman lash at their backs if hands stilled even a moment. He imagined broken bodies, of Nasir fallen and lost to him.

In the forest the surviving group surfaced before Agron's eyes as if from a vision. Agron touched Spartacus' shoulder but moved past him. His heart had stopped for the slumped figure on the ground next to Naevia. Agron knelt and peered into the pale, slack face of Nasir, lifting his chin and finding the warmth of life in his skin. Nasir smiles at him, and it is an impossible, magical thing.

The discovery of Lucius' temple was one they were most grateful for. Agron still held fear each day that Nasir's eyes remained closed. He hovered at the doorway of the room in which Nasir lay, with anxious eyes. The women would chase him away, but he always returned in his free moments, and they could not help but smile at his stubborn persistence.

Nasir appeared on his feet one day and surprised them all. Agron rushed to him, giving in to the impulse to touch his face. _I missed you I need you I want you,_ came Agron's thoughts in a surge, filling him with something he had not felt in a very long time. In lieu of words, Agron pressed a kiss to his mouth like an offering, and again Nasir's smile answered him back.

Their intimacy grew delicately, careful of Nasir's injury. Each kiss plunged Agron deeper into their new love, drew them together all the more. The mere sight of Nasir was like sun bursting through clouds. They were tethered by touch at every opportunity. When at last Nasir's wound was healed, they found a new kind of intimacy, a great fire blazing to life. 

During the nights they stole away to a chamber of their own and discovered each other bit by bit. 

Agron loved how his body utterly overwhelmed Nasir's, how he could curl around him like captured prey. He bent down to kiss him, and Nasir grabbed the back of his neck, meeting his mouth and holding him there as his other hand roamed the hills and valleys of Agron's muscle. Nasir released him and immediately Agron was upon him, undoing fastenings and pulling away clothing, kissing chest, stomach and thighs. 

Agron pushed him back onto their bed, casting aside his own encumbrances, scattering sheets and pillows as he crawled up to devour Nasir's mouth again. Agron's lips moved leisurely over the scruff of Nasir's jawline until his teeth found his neck. Nasir squirmed but Agron pinned him with his weight, delighting in his helpless pleasure. 

At last Nasir put a hand to his chest, grinning as he switched their places, moving over Agron fluidly, a tease of ass brushing past cock. His tongue slid into Agron's mouth as he drew kiss after kiss, loosened hair falling over their faces, their bodies molded together. Soon his kisses trailed down the great expanse of Agron's body, returning bite for bite from hip to sensitive inner thigh, making Agron cry out as Nasir's hand stroked his cock. 

They locked gaze as Nasir placed lingering kisses along the length of him, finally allowing him into the heat of his mouth. Agron's eyes slipped shut and his fingers threaded into Nasir's hair. His hands felt the bob of Nasir's head as Nasir's mouth did lovely things, drawing pleasure in ways Agron had never known. There was yet more. Nasir pulled away and Agron grabbed at him in a haze, but was tamed again with Nasir's hand on his chest. Nasir straddled him, leaning down to kiss the body beneath him before again brushing his ass against cock.

“Another arrangement you may take liking to,” breathed Nasir, smiling down at him with pure desire.

Agron nodded, for any words he might have formed had flown from his head. Nasir guided him into place, impaling himself slowly with shuddering breath as Agron's hands squeezed his thighs. Nasir's hips began careful movement, and their mouths both fell open as sensation hit them hard.

_“Fuck...”_ Agron managed, awash in the beauty of Nasir, his skin and his mouth and his eyes and his body. Agron's hand caressed Nasir's cock, as beautiful as the rest of him.

Nasir writhed deliciously atop him, turning his head, nails digging into the sides of Agron's thighs. Agron sped his movements until Nasir arched backwards, a sweet whimper in his throat, come painting Agron's stomach. Agron sat up with Nasir in his lap. Nasir's arms went around his neck and their mouths met lazily, pleasure-drunk, leaving wet trails over each other's faces.

As Nasir's breathing calmed, he pushed Agron back down, finding movement again. Then Agron's hands gripped Nasir's hips, moving him, controlling him, fucking him exactly as Agron wanted to fuck him. Agron loved watching Nasir, seeing what each thrust did to him, sweaty and flushed and out of his mind. So fucking beautiful. 

Agron pushed himself deep one last time, hips rearing off the bed, Nasir's hands clawing scratches into Agron's chest as Agron came inside of him. Nasir slid off, body melting into Agron's side. He pressed his face to the crook of Agron's shoulder.

“I see you took liking,” Nasir said into his skin, and they laughed together.

 

When sleep took them, Agron dreamed of East of the Rhine, of fire, blood and Duro. He woke to Nasir's hands on either side of his face.

Nasir's brow was furrowed. “You lose yourself.”

“For but a moment,” answered Agron, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

“What is it that draws you from my side?”

“It is nothing. Ghosts of past.”

Nasir laid a hand on his cheek, radiating affection with the simple touch. “A heavy thing you need not bear alone.”

“Are you not troubled by your own?”

“There are times." Nasir sighed. "Perhaps it is blessing that my own brother is so long from memory.”

“You were similar distance in age?”

“We were. Though he was much taller than I.”

“As are most,” said Agron with a grin.

Nasir punched him in the arm. “I imagine you wore Duro's patience, as you do mine.”

“I had thought the reverse... but you speak truth.” Agron smiled, eyes distant for a moment.

Nasir watched him thoughtfully. “May we meet one day, on the shores of the afterlife.”

Agron nodded, looking down into Nasir's face, heart warm.

 

 


End file.
